Care Keralam project launched to validate popular Ayurvedic medicines

Thiruvananthapuram: In order to indentify 20 popular formulations for scientific validation to ensure their wider acceptability, which are marketed mostly as food supplements, the Kerala government along with Ayurveda units set up a facility – Care Keralam.

Care Kerala (the Confederation of Ayurvedic Renaissance Keralam Ltd) is being supported by the National Innovation Council and the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) in this attempt to give international recognition to Ayurvedic medicines.

The project recently validated the anti-diabetes formulation Nishaakathakaadhi Kashayam (NKK), in a first-of-its-kind attempt in the history of Ayurveda, facilitating companies to sell this product as a drug abroad.

"We have been entrusted to do this pioneering scientific study by the National Innovation Council. We are ready to take up more such studies to promote the standardization of Ayurveda products on par with modern medicines," CARe Keralam managing director Karimpuzha Raman said.

CARe Keralam, along with CSIR and other national agencies, was also planning a grand Ayurveda summit to place this age-old Indian system of medicine into limelight and identify the key products for scientific validation with the support of the industry.

Spurred by the huge response to a comprehesive dossier it prepared on NKK, the group planned to hold a clinical trial of the formulation with a minimum 500 subjects to establish the efficacy and safety of the product and officially declare it as a safe medicine as per global standards.

CARe Keralam, a Common Facility Centre established in Koratty in Thrissur district of Kerala, with the support of the AYUSH department, Government of India, had conducted a comprehensive multidisciplinary study on the NKK's eight raw materials, and the Ayurvedic product formulated from them, demonstrating its efficacy and toxicity on rats.